


Cold

by AutumnDiesIrae



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Canon Universe, Canon-Typical Violence, Cold, Collateral Damage, Established Relationship, Eventual Fluff, Eventual Happy Ending, Explosions, Implied Relationships, Injury, Injury Recovery, Loss of Limbs, M/M, Misery, Permanent Injury, Sad, Tears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-20
Updated: 2017-06-20
Packaged: 2018-11-16 15:12:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11255517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AutumnDiesIrae/pseuds/AutumnDiesIrae
Summary: Junkrat was sobbing openly, loud and miserable.“M-me baby…! Me Lúcio…! This is all m-me fault…!”





	Cold

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, I wrote this to make people in the Boombox server sad 8)  
> This ended up being a lot longer than I anticipated, so I'm putting it up here instead of just Tumblr. Enjoy!

“Can you disable it? You’ll have a very short amount of time to,” Morrison had asked.

“What do ya take me for?! Of course I can!” Junkrat had snapped back, irritating that anyone would question his skills.

He wished he had said otherwise.

It was going rather well, all things considered. The Talon agents were pretty easily dealt with, or at the very least, kept at bay by the Tank heroes. Reinhardt’s shield and D.Va’s Defense Matrix dispelled the projectiles aimed at the heroes as the flankers made their way around, knocking snipers from perches and disabling turret fire.

But, as it were, Murphy’s Law decided to rear its ugly head.

Mercy had been forced to back off, carried by Ana, after she was shot in the leg. Only Lúcio and Zenyatta had been left to heal the other heroes. Then Reinhardt’s Barrier had failed, and unable to protect his team from the endless barrage of bullets and shrapnel, he had also been forced back.

“Wait -! We need to back up!” Soldier:76 had shouted, missing a Helix Rocket shot and cursing loudly, "Flankers! Jamison! Get back here!”

“Not a chance!” Junkrat had snapped, hanging upside down from a support beam in the main part of Volskaya Industries, a ways away from the rest of the team, “I’ve almost got the bombs disabled, just need a minute -!”

“We don’t have that time!” Hanzo had barked, before crying out as a stray bullet hit his shoulder.

“Hanzo -!” McCree had supported him as he sunk to the ground, “Rat! Y’heard the commander, come back 'ere!”

“Just – one – minute -!”

Lúcio had been sweating bullets listening to this exchange over his commlink, his blood running cold.

“Listen to them, Jamison, go!” Roadhog had spat, voice angry but mingled with fear, “Your fucking stubbornness is gonna get you killed!”

“There’s no way he’ll get out of there with his leg, he’s too slow…!” Lúcio had said, before bolting out to go find his friend, ignoring the desperate cries from the team to stay.

That was his last mistake.

Junkrat _had_ disabled all the packets of TNT in time, albeit it with difficulty. The last two had been just out of his reach, and before he could move closer to them, he had dropped his wire-cutters when that blue sniper got the drop on him, shooting his prosthetic hand clean through. She likely would have hit his head and killed him cleanly, if not for Lúcio leaping down and using his Soundwave to send her lurching forward a little, throwing off her shot. With his lifeless orange fingers functionally useless, Junkrat had nearly fallen from his perch, but had managed to grab the wires of the final two dynamite clusters. Using his teeth, he had ripped them off, before he had fell down, landing hard.

“I got it…!” he had gasped, “I got the bomb -!”

"Come on, we have to go NOW!"

Lúcio had grabbed his hand, yanking at him as he tried to Speed-Boost them to safety. They _would_ have made it, but the angry sniper had regained her footing, and promptly shot Junkrat in his peg, knocking to the ground and forcing him to crawl. Lúcio, breaking out in a cold sweat, had struggled to pick him up, amidst the sick chorus of despairing sounds from their team, before the sniper had decided she had had enough, and wanted these two nuisances to suffer painfully. Instead of aiming for the boys, she aimed up at the cluster of unlit explosives, firing her bullet into them from a safe hiding spot.

The explosion had been loud. Very loud. For a split second, Junkrat had seen the world through his childhood eyes, for this was a mirror of the detonation of the Omnium from years ago. He did not remember much of what happened after the world went so quiet. Just a lot of pain. Same then. Same now.

And there he was, lying on the floor, feeling numb and cold all over. The only emotion in his brain was regret.

“…”

His mouth was moving, he could feel it, but no sound. There was a very distant sound of thudding. Like Junkrat was underwater. He had nearly drowned once, and this felt a lot like it. Just quiet stillness. Overwhelming silence. It seemed to push against his eardrums, hard and deafening, and it hurt.

Something warm and sticky was running down his face, but he could not feel his arms in order to move them to touch it. Something fleshy flopped across his head. There was his arm. It did not want to obey him, moving like the nerves had been pinched, turning his limb into a useless length of skin and muscle. Breathing hard, Junkrat managed to drag his hand across his face and look at it.

Red.

Red was a nice color. He liked red. He knew somewhere in his head this red was bad, but right now he was lost, thinking about his favorite colors. He liked yellow and orange, for sure. Green too.

_Green._

“…”

He could feel his mouth wrench itself in a scream, but he could not hear the sound. He did not need to. He knew what he was saying.

_Lúcio! LÚCIO!_

Some energy, though he did not know from where, surged forward, forcing him to roll over. The nausea was intense, but the fear was stronger.

“…”

His mouth kept moving, seemingly of its own accord, as he looked around. One sense that was working was smell. The fire, the diesel, the gunpowder, all of it hit him hard – and something else, the most intense of all. Something strong, bitter, metallic. Junkrat had lost limbs before, and he knew that smell. It was the overwhelming stench of blood.

“…ci…”

His eyes were moving wildly, trying to find a familiar shred of green, anything to lock on to, to indicate his boyfriend was here and not blown to pieces. The thought of Lúcio’s lifeless corpse was haunting. It had been bad enough when he’s been shot on the back on another mission and spent a week in the infirmary recovering. This…this would be so much worse…

“…o…”

Some other fluid had joined the blood on his face. Tears.

_Please…not me baby…not me Lúcio…_

“…uci…”

His eye fell on something nearby. Green. Dragging his useless legs behind him as he crawled closer, Junkrat reached out, gripping the arm of his boyfriend. It was so cold…icy cold…

“…Lúcio…!”

He could hear himself call out the DJ's name just then, though he was unsure if it was because his ears were functioning or because he was screaming so loud even the deafness could not stifle it. The agonized wails of a man who was losing his lover.

Lúcio looked like he was banging his fist on Death’s door. Blood was all over his face and body, puddling under him. The only indication Junkrat had that his man was not already gone was the tiny rise and fall of Lúcio’s chest, disgustingly fast, like that of an injured mouse. And it was no shocker why – as Junkrat looked him over, he found to his abject horror that Lúcio’s left arm was gone. Blown off almost completely. The remaining meaty shreds of sinewy flesh hanging from his boyfriend's shoulder made Junkrat want to vomit.

“…p…! …h…!”

His mouth was moving again, likely screaming for help. The tears would not stop. His baby was dying, and he was sitting there, helpless. The sobs were loud, loud enough for even him to faintly hear.

“…lp…! Pl…! S…b…y…! H…p...!”

Something, someone, gripped him from behind, pulling him up. He kicked and thrashed, shrieking and refusing to be pulled away from his Lúcio.

“N…! …t…g…! L…o!”

It was Roadhog, no one else’s hands were that big. Restraining him? No…holding him. Hugging him. Shaking a little too. Something wet was splashing onto Junkrat’s skin. Couldn’t be tears. No. The big oaf never cried. Not even when his partner was dying.

Something sharp pierced his leg, and the world swirled into darkness.

* * *

 

When Junkrat woke up, he felt stiff and exceedingly cold. He came to realize shortly it was a combination of the bandages all over him and the blood loss he had endured. He shifted, trying to ignore the seething pain in his body. His eyes did not want to function, shutting themselves in agony.

“…cio…! W…Lú…?!”

He felt someone gently push him back down, trying to hold him still. He refused, writhing hard and begging for his Lúcio, his froggy, his baby. He had to know he was okay. He could not stand hearing his lover was dead. Not like this. Not when it was his fault.

“…ison…! ...lm…wn…!”

Another set of hands, big and meaty, were pressed against him, keeping him still. He could feel the sobs exploding out of his mouth, as he demanded to be released, begging endlessly for his Lúcio.

Another sharp prick, then nothing.

* * *

 

The third time Junkrat woke since the explosion, he felt different. The heaviness, weariness, they were all largely gone, though he still felt nauseous and very cold. He also became aware, lying in those white sheets in the Watchpoint hospital bay, that he could hear again. Mercy’s Healing Stream must be working.

“…hello…?”

He tried to push himself up into a sitting position, which was hard with one arm.

“Jamison…? You’re awake…how do you feel…?”

Mercy was sitting on a wheelchair, which threw Junkrat off. He had expected her to be taller.

“I…forget about me, where’s -?!”

“Lúcio is in his own room…”

“He’s…he’s not dead, is he?! Please, please, I couldn’t live with that shit, it’s me fault, sheila, I -!”

“Please, Jamison, relax…you’re very weak and you should not exert yourself…”

Ana sent word to Roadhog that his friend was awake. When the biker came, he did not even pause to say hello, nor do his usual spiel of chiding his partner’s failures. Instead, he immediately strode over, gripping Junkrat by the shoulders and pressing their foreheads together. His shoulders shook a little.

“You fucking idiot…” he murmured.

“I…Pigface, c’mon now…”

“Shut up…never do that again…”

Helpless, Junkrat just clung back to his bodyguard, glad for the warmth of a hug.

For the next few days, the blond was not allowed to even ask about Lúcio. Everytime he did, the question was answered with “not now” or “he’s fine”. The noncommittal responses made his blood boil.

“I WANT TO KNOW HOW ME FUCKIN’ BOYFRIEND IS, YA BASTARDS!” he exploded at one point, before Roadhog shushed him back to calmness.

After four days in the infirmary, the combination of biotic technology and bed rest had Junkrat almost fully recovered, though Mercy could not seem to heal the coldness in his body. Symmetra and Törbjorn had begrudgingly rebuilt his prosthetics, allowing him to walk.

 _"Now_ will ya fuckin’ tell me about -?!”

“Lúcio is still in recovery. He was very badly injured and he needs time to rest. He -”

“Is he dead?!”

Mercy jumped a little at the comment.

“He…what?”

“Is. He. Dead. I’m tired of bein’ lied to. Tell me the damn truth! Did I kill me boyfriend or nah?!”

Junkrat became aware of the tears leaking down his face.

“Jamison…no, he’s not dead…come.”

Mercy, who had transferred to crutches a few days prior, hobbled along, leading him to a side room. She quietly opened the door, allowing Junkrat to enter.

Lúcio was lying in a bed. He looked…horrible. Corpse-like. Zenyatta’s Harmony Orb was hovering over his body, doing its best to heal him, but it certainly was struggling to.

There was so much blood on the sheets…

“G-god…Lúcio…!”

Junkrat moved to bolt forward but Roadhog caught him as Mercy explained.

“You can’t, Jamison, he’s…he’s very sick…we had to amputate what was left of his arm and he’s still trying to recover…”

Junkrat was sobbing openly, loud and miserable.

“M-me baby…! Me Lúcio…! This is all m-me fault…!”

He pushed Roadhog away and ran. He could not look at anyone. He felt like he was going to puke, or faint, or both. He just could not stop thinking about the sunken eyes, the trembling lip, the rapid rising and falling chest of his lover, struggling to stay alive in that stained hospital bed.

All because of _him_.

* * *

 

It was so cold. That was the first thing Junkrat allowed himself to notice after what left like years crying into his pillow. Without a warm body to snuggle into, the Aussie shivered and quivered in his bed all night, craving the heat of his man, desperate for that familiar feeling of Lúcio sliding in with him, cuddling him close and keeping him safe and warm.

The same went for the day, when the lack of a hand to hold, a chest to snuggle into, a body to hug, all left Junkrat quietly shaking in his room. He would drag the blanket off his bed and wrap it around himself, trying his best to keep the cold Russian winter at bay.

“Do you want me to turn the heat up, child…?” Ana asked him at least once a day. He always shook his head. It could not replace Lúcio’s role. Junkrat was sure that even if they went back to Australia now, and he was allowed to wander around the desert with the sun pounding on his back and the hot wind buffeting his front, he would still shiver and shake with cold. It was like he had swallowed a bucket of dry ice, and the sensation of freezing was spreading in his body from the inside out.

He took to drinking tea a lot. Well, less drinking it than sitting there in the kitchen, cradling the mug in his hands. It gave him a tiny comfort, as if it was Lúcio’s hands clasped in his grip. But then the tea would run cold, and he would dump it in the sink and make another cup. At one point, he overheard Mercy explaining to Roadhog that it was a psychological thing, as the warmth of the liquid through the mug made one feel like they were holding someone's hand. Junkrat felt he should be upset or offended, but in reality he craved physical affection so badly he could only shut his eyes tight and cling more to the cup.

It was a month before he was allowed to see Lúcio again. By that point the motions of the day were wearing on the blond, like he was stuck in some quasi-twilight zone where he was just talking to himself and holding onto his tea day after day after day. All the while possessed by the icy cold that had not left from the day of the explosion. When Mercy gently put her hands on his shoulders and said softly that he could come see Lúcio, he initially did not react. It felt like he just imagined it, like all the dreams he had been having of Lúcio, cuddling into him and kissing him and saying how much he loved him, and in a moment he woke up and find nothing had changed. It took Mercy repeating herself to get him to snap out of it.

“Wh…what?”

“He’s alert and he wants to see you…there’s no longer a risk of infection, so he should -”

Before she could finish, Junkrat was booking it down the hall to the infirmary, throwing open the door and bolting into Lúcio’s room.

“Lú!”

He ground to a halt when he saw his lover. He still looked worse than his regular self, that was for sure. But he was actually sitting up, looking at him with those shiny, lively brown eyes.

“Jamie…” he murmured, reaching for him.

For some reason, Junkrat’s legs did not want to move at first. Something was tugging at him, reminding him that Lúcio would not even be in that bed if not for him, and he should not be allowed the privilege of embracing his boyfriend again. And yet, love was an overpowering emotion. He flung himself into Lúcio’s arms, hugging him and sobbing.

“Jamison, easy -!” Mercy said, worried.

“Jamie, Jamie baby, shh, shh, it’s okay…” Lúcio reassured, cradling him as best he could with one arm, “It’s okay, I’m here…”

“I-it’s all me fault…!” Junkrat wailed, “I hurt ya…! I hurt me own baby…!”

“No, no, Jamie, shh…you didn’t hurt me…you did your job, you disabled those bombs, it’s not your fault what happened…shh…”

The two stayed that way, wrapped in each other’s tight embrace for what felt like eons. Junkrat would have been happy to stay that way for the rest of his life, but eventually the engineers had to interrupt. They had constructed Lúcio his own prosthetic arm, not dissimilar to Symmetra’s, though it was colored a suitable green, with yellow details. It took a good hour of learning, but Lúcio began to acclimate to the robotic fingers and how they moved. He looks lopsided with it, and the guilt ate at Junkrat, spreading its cold fingers across his chest.

“Can I still use my Sonic Amplifier…?” Lúcio asked.

“You will still be capable of using the _Vishkar’s_ technology, yes,” Symmetra said curtly, pursing her lips. Junkrat hissed at her, pulling Lúcio close.

“Alright, everyone… Lúcio needs to rest…” Mercy said quietly, ushering the visitors out, “That includes you, Jamison…”

“No…please, please, let me stay…” he begged, craving the feel of Lúcio’s skin, “Please…”

“C’mon, Dr. Ziegler…” Lúcio said, looking at her pleadingly, “It’s okay, we’ll sleep, I promise…”

She opened her mouth to argue, but exhaled instead.

“Very well. But you must _actually_ sleep. No funny business.”

“I don’t think either of us have the energy for that, doc…” Lúcio chuckled, stroking Junkrat’s fluffy hair.

“I hope not,” she said, before closing the door.

Lúcio lay back on his new, clean pillows, still absently testing his prosthesis.

“You’ll have to train me how to use this…”

“I…yeah, of course…” Junkrat murmured, kicking off his shoe and lying down such that his face was pressed into Lúcio’s neck, “I missed you…so much…”

“I could tell, honey…” Lúcio kissed his head gently, “ _Meu amorzinho_ … _meu querido_ …”

He continued to murmur sweet Portuguese nicknames in Junkrat’s ear as the Aussie’s eyes grew heavy. He felt his arm wrap absently around Lúcio’s belly as he snuggled closer, wanting nothing more than to feel the warmth of his lover’s presence. Finally, the cold that had been lingering in his body began to fade, chased away by Lúcio's loving heat. Junkrat snuggled closer, seeking it hungrily, not ever wanting to lose it again.

“Good night, baby…sleep well…” Lúcio said quietly, stroking Junkrat’s head until the blond sunk into the first good sleep he had had in weeks.

Warm, and loved.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Any comments/kudos are appreciated greatly, as always.
> 
> Link to my blog: http://autumndiesirae.tumblr.com/  
> Link to my art blog: http://artumndiesirae.tumblr.com/


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